


Survivors

by Mareel



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Gen, Xindi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-19
Updated: 2012-06-19
Packaged: 2017-11-08 02:41:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/438252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mareel/pseuds/Mareel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Distant ripples from a planet's destruction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Survivors

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of a set of stories exploring the AU of the the episode "E2" where _Enterprise_ has been shifted 117 years into the past. At the time of these events, the ship and crew have been in the past timeline for approximately six years. 
> 
> This is Jonathan's voice, and it refers to events and conversations with the Xindi Arboreal plant manager Gralik that take place in the Season 3 episode "The Shipment."

 

It's purely by chance that we are here at all. 

In the midst of negotiations for engineering supplies, our Thal’seki hosts casually mentioned that one item we needed might be available on another planet in this system. They knew of no other source, but were certain we would enjoy visiting that world… an isolated cloud-mining settlement with majestic rocky hills and dwellings built into cliff faces. 

I blame myself for not putting the pieces together. None of us did, none of the star charts we’d been collecting gave any hint of what we were to find. I credit Malcolm’s caution for ensuring that our approach was undetected.

Xindi Avians - the last of their kind.

_________________________

 

I know we should give this planet a wide berth and find the supplies we need elsewhere. But something in me longs to meet them… to learn something of them.

There had been awe in Gralik’s voice when he spoke of this sixth Xindi species. ‘They were the best of us,’ the Arboreal told me, ‘the most purely devoted to the study of nature and philosophy. Though ill-adapted for technology and with little interest in its development, even the Aquatics looked to them as sages and elders. It was said that, in ancient days, they could live a thousand years… but I don’t know the truth of that.’

I heard his regret as we shared a drink to toast our newly established trust. 'The Reptilians despised them for their less aggressive worldview, but I doubt they deliberately destroyed Xindus to eliminate them. Alliances shifted continually… not unlike today, just more overtly.'

_________________________

 

I never expected them to be so large. When Gralik told me of his grandfather’s time, when the skies of Xindus were dark with Avians, I imagined a species of comparable size to the other Xindi races – bigger than sea eagles, but smaller than the skeletons I’ve seen of Pterodactyls and other winged reptiles.

But while our scans indicate that their skulls are of vaguely humanoid size, their wingspans are immense. It’s little wonder that they never developed spacegoing vessels. I can only assume that those living on isolated worlds like this had traveled here in the bellies of huge ships, perhaps built by the Aquatics. 

Dr. Phlox has another theory… that they were brought here as young – or even as eggs – and grew up on this mist-shrouded world.

_________________________

 

The last of their kind. Clinging to this small, rocky outpost far from Xindus… their home destroyed by civil war along with the rest of the Avian population.

I’m certain they’re doomed to the same extinction… a hundred years from now, there are no surviving Avians. But sometimes even a small population can manage to thrive in semi-isolation – look at the humans here on _Enterprise_. Only seventy-five of us, but we plan to survive until then. 

As if he were following my thoughts, Phlox speaks up. “I don’t think that’s a colony in any viable sense, Captain. More of a camp, perhaps. It appears that virtually all of the Xindi lifesigns on that planet are male.”

I know I can’t risk the ship and crew… and our mission… to satisfy my curiosity. We will have to locate another source for the material we need. We’ve carefully avoided Xindi encounters over the past six years; this is no time to announce ourselves. Still, I’ll always regret the missed opportunity to make peaceful contact with our future enemies. 

Would it have made any difference?


End file.
